Look, what I found in my mailbox...

Retreat in Northern Cyprus

Sometimes I love receiving emails. A friend informed me about her new retreat, have a look......
Villa Sophia is waiting for you!

Enjoy a special week of yoga and meditation at this beautiful villa within the olive groves of Northern Cyprus.......

Valentine's Cardi

Love to you - Copy and Paste 

Happy Valentine's Day!!!

We do not do this Valentine thing as according to my dear love it is a consumer thing. Honestly I am lucky if we do birthdays or Christmas...... But I DO THIS, so I woke him up with a cappuccino made with extra love and shared my love to him as well. The answer I got was: Ditto, copy and paste. Well I guess it was early and he might have been still dreaming.....

The day itself did not start too good either, even before that, I spare you the details of kids and making a mess, but somehow I am in a very good mood.

Probably because it is my working day today and I have done already so much as I started working last night. Sometimes I have so much in my head that I cannot stop standing by my doll (tailor's dummy). I love creating live and enjoy that I have learnt so much already. So only a few hours later and I designed a long sleeve top, a T-shirt and a cardigan. I mentioned it before I cannot have too many cardigans, especially because my favorite got blown away and I haven't made a new favorite until now......(actually that is a lie, this hooded cardigan was my dearest companion for the last freezing weeks, ah months)

The grey cardi is made of a wool mix in grey, a very light fabric. It has one seam at the back. At the front it is closed with two upcycled mega press studs. It has a hint of a cowl neck collar which looks quite interesting. The cut is figure fit, not too tight and as the studs are somewhere in the middle, the bottom of the cardigan drapes open. The contrasting seams are red. I love it already!

Love.

New Grounds - Drape & Shape

How you do it, it's right!

The other day I made my son a sandwich and he came back to the kitchen crying to break hearts. When I asked him what's wrong he said I did not make a sandwich as in half it and fold it on top of each other. I am sure if I would have done exactly that it would have been wrong as well. I am not questioning this behavior but I also can't blame him as I am not very different. 

I need things to be my way. Or maybe that is not true, I just don't want to feel uncomfortable, and sometimes things need a long time to be reduced to the max. When I had an outing to browse the High street I could find nice clothes, but looking closer or trying them on I could only find issues. The material was wrong or seams uncomfortable, it might have looked nice but it was hardly wearable and so on. I had to leave it and cannot call myself a customer anymore, even if I try very hard.

And now I am designing my own clothes I am not different at all. I might be very pleased with a new design but I need to put it to the test and only if I still like it then it will be part of my collection. This might be a too different approach as we live in a throw away society. But I always loved the garments worn to death the most and even when they were beyond it. 

The collection is completed and I am up to new grounds. In the collection I worked a lot with one-piece designs. The idea is that it is more comfortable to wear and a challenge but looks very different too. This time I wanted to drape more. This is even more of a challenge as drape and one piece is not easy to solve.

The top has one seam on one side. The other side drapes. Not too much as I still prefer plain cuts but enough to be a decorative element and shape around the body differently. The leggings are even more comfortable than the Hand stitched Yoga pants as there is hardly any contact to the body. 

Now in test phase and still only a first attempt in a new direction I am sketching and designing already more.....

In Training

New year

It seems that this year is everything else than superficial. I found already great music, geared up my Yoga props and changed my daily practice. Up somewhere around 4 am I start the day like in a cloud or dream. It is not really hard to get up at this hour for me, I am perfectly trained after two toddlers who still venture in my bed nowadays. 

The most challenging is to keep the time. I am slower but also this practice is much longer than anyone I had so far...... I try to finish before everybody is up but mostly end up with a little boy or two lying on my tummy or a demand for breakfast. 

It goes very deep to dedicate this golden hour to turn inside. And as a consequence during the day I feel sort of minced and incredibly tired. I notice it is getting better and the day does not seem endless anymore but I still have a long way to go before I fully integrated this routine into my life.

That does not keep me from designing new outfits. My head is bursting and I am looking forward to spend some time with the doll (tailor's dummy) over the next dew days......

ps:
I had some lovely feedback on my new collection, wearing it on a Yoga course I was attending. In a random conversation some ladies mentioned they could not find any nice Yoga Wear and where I got mine from, thank you!

The New Collection on the Beach

Finally ready to let go of 2013 . . . .

I am soooooo tired - But it was a good day. 

The last weeks I did nothing else but finishing off my NEW Collection - BASIS - and today I was ready to take all the pieces with me to the Beach to take some pics. Obviously it was freezing cold but the sun was out and we chose a rather sheltered corner. So filled with my excitement of being at the Beach - home! - but also because I finally can show the collection and offer it in my shop, I felt almost warm.

Just after a couple of hours I could not feel my toes anymore and we had enough shots captured and could drive back home, where we shot the rest of the details and voilà: my first listing is online!

The collection is the Best of ONE year work. There are Yoga pants, three different styles of Long sleeve Tops including a Tunic and a Tank Top and ALL pieces are Hand stitched. I offer size S, M or L and the fabric is either Organic Bamboo/Cotton Jersey or Organic Cotton Jersey in black, white and colours. (I will show the colours available but will have to order them on demand according to availability.) For the seams there is a choice of contrasting Red, or a similar colour to the tone of the chosen material and you can state your wish at the check-out.

There is still much more to do but I can feel a chapter is finishing and I am ready for the New of 2014! 

100 days and The Lotus

Experience of a daily practice

I do not want to blame all on my kids but it took me an incredibly long time to find a routine in my new life. Not so much caring for the kids but meeting my own needs. Sadly it included a vast amount of energy to make all the family members take their share, not sure but it might have been easier to accomplish this with female household members, saying that, my oldest son complained this morning that the kitchen has too many things lying around and it was impossible for him to get some more breakfast (being 4 and a half he is climbing everywhere to get what he wants).

I never have stopped with my yoga practice but I have been drained for a long time mainly due to sleep deprivation. But combined with Aqua Running and 3 weeks on my own with the kids (where I had nothing better to do in the evening than doing yoga) I could gather a lot of stamina that I do not wish to loose again.

It has been almost 100 days since I have started with The Bound Lotus. As so often I do not know how things make it into my life but there it is and I am very fond of this practice. 

I must mention at this point that also this practice challenges me a lot. First I had to practice the Lotus position as I have been avoiding full Lotus for the past years. So part of the warm-up set now is to stretch my legs to achieve Lotus easier. And it is working. I manage to sit without props in full Lotus. My hands are still far away from grabbing my toes (after crossing them on the back) but I think I will emphasize on this stretch from now on. Also the head does not touch the ground yet, but I approach this while sitting in Bound Lotus, and I get closer, every day a bit more. But there is still much more stretching to do for Lotus and arms, so this might take a bit longer.

As the practice only counts if you do not skip one day I had to discipline myself to start the day with Bound Lotus. So no matter what conditions I will warm-up and stretch and do the Bound Lotus before I start anything else. Because from experience I know once I have started the day there is no stopping and a day would feel wrong without Bound Lotus at the very beginning. 

And here I am 100 days later, happy to have found this practice as it replaces meditation for me at the moment. Because to sit still in mediation will require another quarter of a lifetime.
Practice on.

More about Bound Lotus here.

Highlights, Lowlights, Obesession & Bra-less

Happy New Year!

We did our Highlights and Lowlights of 2013, it seems very short this last year - very busy, a lot of experimenting, set backs and successes. I am happy to let go of 13 and stand tall for 14.

I had to post this new, old project again, sorry about that. But the bra issue is a very important one to me and I think I might have solved it, but I cannot promise not to continue to experiment in this matter. 

No impact fashion means that I do not feel what I am wearing. The first time I noticed the opposite was when I felt sick of wearing jeans as they squeezed my tummy. Not only that but I found the seams bulky and painful on the body. I could continue with shoes and so on... My conclusion is I do not want to feel anything I am wearing at all. Fashion should gently sculpt around me and support my body if required and look good, preferably in an organic Cotton or Bamboo Jersey.

So the bra saga needed to be continued, as the last one, the bratank could not maintain position while exercising. To solve this is quite a task as I still refuse to use an elastic band to hold the position. I tried darts but apart from not doing anything they disturb the simpleness and do not add to good looks.

So this approach is completely different. The straps are cut in an angle and I subtracted the darts that would be in the front on the sides and additionally also on the back which gives this Hand stitched bra-less a strong V-shape. The length is the middle way between bra and bratank, long enough to include strong movement. 

The V acts as elastic band as the slight tension helps keeping the position. Still only one seam at the back, I decided to fold the hem over instead of adding it in form of a strip of Jersey.

Much more sophisticated but also simpler than all versions prior to this one, this bra-less is in test phase and feels perfect. As I said, I might not end my bra journey here but this is it for this Year.

Happy New Year, thanks for reading, supporting and participating.
Peace.

New & Merry

An early Christmas Treat and Best Wishes!

The Year is almost over and I am very excited what the New one will bring. It seems already busy and full of challenges. But this is for a new blog post.

For now I want to wish you all a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year!


I thought it is time to treat myself to a new Yoga Mat after 15 years. It seems it starts a whole new chapter.

Peace.

Bob and the hooded Tunic

I probably should be stressing about ...

It is all a bit hectic and busy. If I could I would be on a sunny warm island, watching the kids dig in the sand right now. 

Off school, Birthdays, Christmas and little parties are making december an interesting month. I am very busy but not very christmas-y so I just do all I need to do and try to take one step at the time. Before diving into some child-minding days I had one working day to myself and was very successful.

I avoided to get to town to get the fabric that I had in mind. So instead of using a fleece and creating a winter tunic that includes a hoodie to warm my head instead of a hat I found some very nice wool-mix in midnight blue in one of my boxes. I don't know why hoodies are on my mind at the moment but I guess it is the desire to hibernate and some japanese influence.


I can wear this lighter version with layers and probably all year round. The hood is disguised in a scarf and still warms my head in this freezing weather. This Hand stitched Tunic is made out of one piece and the hood. Slightly V-shaped is leaves enough room for layers. Off to test it I still might venture to get some fleece for a second one, after the holidays. 

I really love projects that go fast and are simple but still have nice details. I guess when the kids are both in school that will change. Working on the model I was thinking for ages that a wrist pin cushion would be handy, as I do not want to have to get another scan in case I swallow a pin. So I was searching for DIY ones. Also handmade pin cushions crossed my search and I was about to get one when I remembered another idea I had. 

I can get quite annoyed that things take so much time. 
The kids have grown out of babyhood and I got rid of a lot of things but kept the best of. Either to find a baby that I could give it to or ebay but as a lot in my life it just stood there in a bag on the landing prepared to be dealt with. And today I was glad I did not give it away. I found what I was looking for. An early learning sock for newborns, with a rattle in form of a bug. And voila, 10 minutes later I had my wrist pin cushion, Bob.

I cut the rattle out, put a bit of plastic on the bottom as protection from pins and sew it back together. The sock I just cut off into a wrist band and sew the seam down to secure it. 
The kids obviously want it now I have it on me. But it is mine!!!

Namaste Ringo Starr

The rain stopped for a minute

One day I will look back and think How did we do all this?

Kids seriously changed my life. I am not sure how other parents do it and whether kids get pressed into their life or parents give up their life for the kids. Or is there a secret of how to do it? In our case it is two self-employed parents obsessed with their work sharing this pleasure of raising two little boys and this can take funny routes. While we keep arguing about our working time the boys began to copy us and say they are busy working now or ask us to print out the pictures they have just taken. It is a dance to meet everybody's needs. And then one day they are both off to school and I will miss the chaos and my working days might seem endlessly long until they are back home.

I guess it is the end of the year that makes me pensive. I am waiting for some new fabric to test and to finish the collection with, meanwhile I finish orders and presents. 

Yesterday I took all my energy to drag us to a photo shooting. It was in my head and needed to get out. But it rained. The solution was a warehouse with a roof, so the photos could still be taken. Nice location, but the picture in my head was a different one and this morning it did not rain. The car was available, so we packed the two kids and the camera and took off to school. While one was playing in school the other one was screaming in the car, a lorry in his hands watching me warming up to do some sun salutations. Time is precious, so half warmed up I posed barefoot in front of Ringo Starr's Birth House. 

It is not a nice area to walk on your own or to walk at all but I love those abandoned streets. I am not spending my time scouting around Liverpool but I do hope we will take more photos at interesting locations like this. 

Sneak Preview: Hand stitched Yoga Pants, Tank Top and Tunic

Au Revoir Bra

French Movie

The days are too short! I am not talking about the season or the weather but lately I love to distract myself with movies. This winter obsession started living on a Remote Island. I am still sort of remote and feel drawn to french movies at the moment. I might have improved my french but it also makes more sense to me to watch a french movie. The last one was not really typical also because it did have a relatively good ending. It was all about Coco Chanel and although I might recognize her style I have not been familiar with how she started in fashion. One sentence in the movie was quite accurate to what I am working on at the moment, something like Don't you want to breathe? 

I am still holding my breath once in a while and I often find myself adjusting a breathing pattern. I am currently also trying to stop coughing as I remember having pulled a muscle which is very painful and I am about to repeat this. And then I keep finding discussions about bra yes or no online and whether the support would be actually greater without one. 

All personal stuff and I guess there are preferences. Since nursing children is part of my past I started questioning the comfort of bras and also developed a Yoga Bra which is very comfortable. But as I am spoiling myself with comfort I have to move on to higher comfort. The result of the last week's impressions is this Hand Stitched Bratank. It is made of Organic Bamboo/Cotton Jersey which contains a small percentage of elastane and is very very nice to wear. The stretch is strong enough to support but gentle enough not to feel wrapped up. The Bratank is in test phase and I will see whether this is it or I still need to watch more french movies. 

Can I ever watch too many?